Recent Home Theater Editorials

The Exodus 1 is a new smartphone by HTC featuring extra security measures for your blockchain, cryptocurrency keys and other data completely off-grid. A separate processor, walled off from the CPU running the android OS, provides a secure environment to store cryptocurrency keys and sensitive login information, without the security hazards of sharing to the cloud or with any apps on your device. It also features up-to-date specs for today's flagship phones. But if this phone is a must-have for you, get out your Bitcoin or Ethereum, because you can only buy the Exodus 1 directly from HTC using cryptocurrency. It's sure to be a niche device, so HTC has only made limited supply.

Brooklyn-based headphone startup Even says that every listener has a unique “EarPrint,” like a fingerprint that affects the way we hear. Its new technology tests your hearing and automatically adjusts the sound to create a personalized listening experience. Is this the future of headphone audio, or is it just a gimmick?

Bowers & Wilkins, the famous British audio brand, is announcing the relocation of its world-famous research and development center to a new and larger facility with cutting-edge equipment and tools. The move represents a significant investment to expand the team and accelerate the company’s ability to develop new capabilities that will drive innovation across its suite of luxury home speakers, headphones and performance car audio. We got a chance to talk to B&W about their new facility and ask some in depth questions every Audioholic wants to know.

We managed to sit down with Bill Dudleston, founder of Legacy Audio for a one-on-one interview about his brand and loudspeaker designs that have garnered so much industry respect over the years. Their core philosophy and no-nonsense approach to loudspeaker design has always resonated with me and has been a personal inspiration to learn more about the art and science of loudspeaker design. Combine top quality parts, excellent craftsmanship and engineering and you're left with... a Legacy product. Check out our recently added YouTube On-Location Video.

Last month, we took a humorous trip down memory lane and recounted some of the most glorious failures in audio-video history. Now, we’re going to shift gears a bit and focus on what went right. In this article we’re going to look at the specific technologies and product categories that have paved the way for the role A/V electronics play in our lives today. See what made our list of the most successful A/V consumer electronics for the last 50 years.

After a stellar 14-year run, Oppo has announced that it will begin the process of ending manufacturing of new products. Customers needn’t worry, Oppo will continue to honor warranties and will even continue out-of-warranty repair while also providing periodic firmware updates for its current blu-ray players. Oppo was an exceptional AV company that truly cared about the quality of their products and serving their customers and are proving it even as they are winding down their business.

Memorializing the Compact Disc. Once upon a time, the CD was the ubiquitous music platform. Our story outlines how the disc-based music technology was adopted, loved and eventually abandoned by a generation that arrived a little too late to collect vinyl record albums. In its day, the CD weathered a storm of competitors that sought to usurp the audio throne by offering key improvements in storage capacity and audio resolution. But behind the inevitable fall of the CD is a story of how the music industry refused to read the writing on the wall. Now that the once dominant audio platform's days are behind us the question remains: Did you like CDs?

While we all enjoy the latest technologies afforded to us in consumer electronics, early adopters often pay the price by getting behind new formats that dry up as quickly as the cash they sunk into them. Let's take a look at what we feel to be the biggest product failures in consumer A/V electronics and try to figure out what went wrong and how missteps today may lead to success stories tomorrow. Some of these are well-known and familiar to everyone; while others are less well-known but their failure was no less spectacular.

With Disney soon to own a majority of Fox TV and film Studios, the stars may have just aligned for the creation of the most powerful media conglomerate ever created. We also have plenty of possible new story lines to look forward to. Will mutants join the Marvel cinematic universe? What will the future of Hulu and Disney direct-to-consumer look like? And most importantly, how will the Simpsons deal with being employees of the House of Mickey Mouse? These are sure to be interesting times for comic nerds and cord-cutters alike.

The end is nigh for net neutrality as it exists today. Trump-appointed FCC chief Ajit Pai put forth a plan last week that promises to roll back Obama’s net neutrality policies. All that’s left is for the five FCC commissioners to vote in December, making the rollback a virtual certainty. But, will the principles of net neutrality die with the FCC? Considering Obama's net neutrality was built on laws designed for a depression-era phone company, perhaps the door is open for modern law that govern the Internet.

The economics of videogames is serious business. Budgets for high-profile games routinely outclass those of blockbuster movies, not to mention the GDP of small independent nations. But, did EA take a step too far in trying to wring even greater profits from games through overuse of microtransacations? The gaming community seems to think so, never has the backlash against a videogame been so great as what we saw last week during the launch of EA's Star Wars Battlefront II. Is it fair to reward advantages to players that pay?

Sound United and DTS have announced the availability of an important DTS Virtual:X firmware update for many Denon and Marantz A/V receiver models. Even more models are getting the update over the next couple of months. DTS says its Virtual:X technology can bring increased levels of immersion to your surround sound system whether you're using your receiver for stereo, 5.1 or 7.1.4. Check to see your receiver is on the list getting update right away.

It's been a few years since the official unveiling of DTS Headphone: X, a new technology that promises to change how we listen to music, movies, and television using our favorite headphones. Now, that technology is finally starting to roll out, with the most recent introduction of the Nubia Z17S Android smartphone, initial reviews are mostly underwhelmed. With a limited and expensive music library thus far, will DTS Headphone: X make waves in hi-fi, or is it destined to remain just another smartphone app?

You might not know it but Auro-3D is the granddaddy of immersive audio. Armed with Denon's AVR-X7200WA receiver, we took a good hard look at Auro-3D's technology, how to take advantage of it at home, and how it performed in a real-world setup. We give you our candid thoughts about what makes Auro-3D special among competing immersive formats and some of the downsides that come with trying to run parallel Auro-3D, Dolby Atmos, and DTS:X immersive surround speaker installations.